The 259 British ships carried 2,184 British officers and 58 Foreign officers, the latter consisting of 16 Norwegians, 13 Americans, 8 Danes, 5 Swiss, 7 Japanese, 4 Dutch, 2 Belgians, and 3 Russians.
Thus the proportion of Foreign officers in British ships was 2.65 per cent., comprising 8 nationalities, an increase of 0.44 per cent, with a decrease in numbers of officers and ships.
The 491 Foreign ships carried 3,432 officers, of whom 58 were British, as follows:-
1916 1917 In Chinese ships 19 ... Japanese ships 42 3 French ships 0 2 Russian ships 1 0 United States ships 15 11 69 58Thus, 1.6 per cent of the officers serving in Foreign ships were of British nationality, with a decrease in the number of officers and an increase in the number of ships.
The Nationality of the Crews in British and in Foreign Ships was as follows :-
VESSELS BRITISH CREW AMERICANS AND ASIATICS EUROPEANS 1916 1917 1916 1917 British, 281259 16,902
12,889 533
699 Foreign, 436
491 10,640
12,030 110,982
123,219 1,078
1,026 126,283
106,555 Total, 717
750 17,980
13,915 11,173
12,729 237,265
229,774
Hence in British ships:
1916 1917 11.76% of the crews were British. 0.37% 0.38 % of the crews were other Europeans. 87.87 % 89.70% of the crews were Asiatics.And in Foreign ships :-
1916 1917 0.88% 0.75% of the crews were British. 8.67% 8.83% of the crews were other Europeans. 90.45 % 90.42% of the crews were Asiatics.